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mathematicism (Pythagoreanism, Leibnizianism, etc.) and Hinduism

Much/most of this sub-forum refers to Western dualist or materialistic science. However, when science started in the West, maybe around the time of Pythagoras or one of his teachers (or some people refer to some older person Hermes Trismegistus, who may have actually been later) there was idealist/mentalist/spiritualist science as well as perhaps materialism (Atomism, etc.) Pythagoras was one of the idealists, who studied in Egypt, Mesopotamia, maybe India, or India's ideas reached him, because he believed in reincarnation and was vegetarian/vegan (maybe also because of the pre-Christian, non-Abrahamic Northern Essenes whom may have been influenced by India.)

Pythagoras was one of the first philosopher-scientist-mathematicians in the West. There are theories of some in ancient India, or maybe some people here even know some, like there's a whole theory of Vedic mathematics. The standard philosophical viewpoint in math is Platonism, from Pythagoreanism, which are both forms of rationalist idealism. They state that the universe seems orderly, so is logical/rational, and exists as ideas/mind/spirit. Until maybe scientist Isaac Newton, idealism, dualism (says both mind/spirit and matter exist) and materialism (not as much until him) were all competing ideas. The philosopher Rene Descartes seemed like a dualist, but probably was really rationalist idealist. He came up with some ideas Newton and others used, then because of them, materialism increased until the modern day.

I'm just saying, materialism and matter-focused dualism aren't the only two schools of thought in science, because maths' Western founder--Pythagoras--was mathematicist rationalist idealist (mathematicist.) Pythagoras said ‘All is number,’ ‘Number rules the universe.’ Rationalist idealism should be seen as a very important view in science. Much of ancient/Classical Greek philosophy was similar to Hinduism, etc., not just in cosmology but things like morality. Several philosophies through Platonism, Neopythagoreanism, Neoplatonism, and, according to certain contemporary science writers, also some German Idealism such as Leibnizianism, continued mathematicism.

There are contemporary philosophy/science/mathematics writers detailing a mathematicist view of the world, and they call themselves the Pythagorean(-Leibnizian) Illuminati (PI.) Illuminati means ‘enlightened ones’ and refers to Classical Greek philosopher Plato's definition (in his book The Republic) of philosophers as enlightened. They don't really believe they've attained perfect knowledge, but maybe in the last several years/decades, the best scientific model of reality, and they aspire to superhuman knowledge. They said that Hinduism (and when asked, also Jainism) as an idealist system that included some rationalist philosophies, is the best philosophy/religion of India, and they quoted several Hindu statements similar to Pythagoras. Later, probably to interest more Western scientists, the PI started to criticize how more religions explained the world, like pointing out how Buddhism denies self, and even (through deconstructionism & anti-logic) denies itself... the PI later even saying they don't think they can try to work with Hindus anymore, because of emotionalistic mysticism. I'm not sure they really tried on a large scale, or just said that to appease Western scientists. Anyway, there's a lot of similarity between mathematicist Western philosophy and the scientific/mathematical/logical aspects of Hinduism. Those have more in common with Pythagorean-derived mathematicism than with modern Western materialistic science.

Even in Hindu dualism, maybe some people feel more like they want to be idealist (monist, Advaita) but have to focus on the material world sometimes so are dualist/etc. (or think there are several lokas/‘worlds’/etc.) The PI philosophy is idealist, but a ‘dual-aspect’ idealism in which the material world is like Maya, illusion, but is an ‘objective illusion,’ and shared dream. Most of us can agree we all (when incarnate) exist in the material world, and it works by some sort of scientific laws we all are under, so that's why it's objective. However, the theory is it's still in the mind, rather than the mind being in matter, so you can also say matter doesn't exist independently, and then, it is like a dream.

I don't have Hindu cosmology anymore rather than contemporary Neopythagorean-Leibnizian cosmology, but in earlier writing they admit there are some aspects they missed. As has often been said since the world started to become more interconnected, philosophies like Hinduism focus more on the internal or spiritual world, and philosophies like even some Classical Western philosophy focus a lot on the external, illusory material world, even if they state it is illusory.

Hindu (and apparently also Chinese/Taoist) Yogis discovered the spiritual energy that exists in a human being and makes one live, which a goal of Yoga is to activate, which happened to me, as I discussed in the Hatha & Kriya Yoga sub-forum and maybe elsewhere. The Greeks represented this by Hermes' caduceus (snakes coiled on a staff such as with seven positions) but there's no further description of that energy in Western philosophy (apart from some later occult philosophy, and West Asian stuff that interacted with Greek.)

So, to get a total picture of reality, you need something like mathematical analysis of the material world from the macrocosmic to microcosmic levels (as Western science has done on some levels) but also the mathematical analysis of the spiritual world, such as the Yogic-spiritual energy that exists in a human being and makes one live. That's why I'm glad this sub-forum is here, and I'd like to see more dialogue between Western (more idealist version) science and Yoga/etc. Mathematicism doesn't mean there isn't any subjective world, or no emotions either, just that all that is understandable.

Last edited by DavidC; 13 January 2017 at 04:13 AM.
Reason: elaboration/correction

Re: mathematicism (Pythagoreanism, Leibnizianism, etc.) and Hinduism

Namaste,

As a wise old man said, "History is a bunch of lies that a roomful of historians agree to." Millions of stories have been floated about the Western philosophers. About Pythagoras, Wikipedia gives so many random, unsubstantiated stories and then says, "There is little direct evidence as to the kind and amount of knowledge which Pythagoras acquired, or as to his definite philosophical views." That just about sums it all up - made up stories embellished and propagated to give credence to the intellect of one's ancestors/civilization. Lots of trial balloons full of hot air!

Hinduism is a very ancient religion/philosophy. Why does it have to be looked at through the faulty prism of Western thought/civilization to validate it? Why does it have to be compared to meaningless materialistic jibberish? What is the purpose of a dialog - Perhaps to give credence to what Pythagoras and his successors came up with? Surely India/Hindus may not have a monopoly on all material knowledge and gifted people appeared at other places in the modern world to document the symmetry of material nature, like the Pythagorean Theorem, but to elevate them to the level of ancient Hindu thought about spirituality/philosophy is a deliberate attempt to cheapen Hindu scriptures. Spirituality cannot be perceived by a materialist or be validated in a lab by conducting some experiments subject to a set of mathematical principles. It falls under the purview of a devotee, devoted to the Divine.

As all philosophers are, the Greek and other Western philosophers were perhaps too consumed with what was going through their heads to care about their appearances. Yet, all the modern day busts of these philosophers have neatly trimmed facial hair and sharply chiseled features. Were they all pretty boys or do we want to depict them as the neatly trimmed, most handsome humans with brains big enough to dissect material phenomenon?

Re: mathematicism (Pythagoreanism, Leibnizianism, etc.) and Hinduism

Namaste

mathematicism (Pythagoreanism, Leibnizianism, etc.) and Hinduism

Why so much love for the brown man? I wonder why intellects don't do similar analysis on the achievements (or at least claimed by) slit eyed? They too have vast resources on mind, matter etc. Why can't an intellectual person respect an another intellectual person instead of wasting time, resources as well as self respect . Is it too hard to digest the intellectual capacity of eastern folks?

Few months ago, one member turned up wondering the origin of Indus valley Gods and now we have this...

History is well aware how the invading army destroyed intellectual contributions and wealth of Indian sub continent and how they rewrote the history. Translation made by Griffith and the likes are the testimony.

The situation is so bad that we can't even rebuild a destroyed temple on the place originally it stood. We had to excavate proofs from devastated locations to get it done, otherwise, whole protectors of HUMANITY will FIND the emerging intolerance using the same SOPHISTICATED INSTRUMENTS used by the allied to locate WMD in Asia.

No one can deny that that the invading army was the brain child of the followers of Abraham. And they never feel sorry for what they did. Another member from HDF had once said, the present generation shouldn't be held responsible for the noble works done by the Abrahamic followers. I like this logic. Anything positive we shall link it up with Abraham and regarding the remnants dumping ground is brown man's chest.

Re: mathematicism (Pythagoreanism, Leibnizianism, etc.) and Hinduism

Originally Posted by Believer

symmetry of material nature, like the Pythagorean Theorem

I'm not sure you read my whole post. Pythagoras, etc., were idealists/mentalists/spiritualists--mathematics is mental, not material. In philosophy, idealism/mentalism/spiritualism opposes materialism. So, the original Western philosophy/science/math (by the mystic Pythagoras, unless you consider Thales started science) was mental/spiritual, not material.

It's true there is speculation about history, as well as things generally considered to be known, and many historians describe their version to promote some viewpoint they have, but I won't get into most of that for now.

I've read books about Pythagoras before Wikipedia ever existed, and it's generally considered ancient Greek idealists/mentalists/spiritualists (and perhaps many other European pagans) like Pythagoras and Plato had an eternalist view with reincarnation instead of the modern materialist science view of one life, copied from Abrahamism. Whether their Hindu-type ideas were from India or a general ancient culture idea, may still be debated.

I don't consider Western thought faulty or Hinduism invalid, or that one makes the other true. I think their ancient ideas were similar, now they have diverged, and a more accurate view of reality could be arrived at with ideas from both, which is my reason for dialogue. I'm just saying that early/earliest Western science/math was idealist/mentalist/spiritualist, as Hinduism is (unless you include the rare materialism, maybe died out, of the six classic philosophies) and so in the context of this sub-forum, Science And Religion, classic idealist/materialist/spiritualist science has more in common with Hinduism than modern empiricist (sense-focused, experiment-focused rather than logic-focused) materialist science.

I think I recall from reading about Hindu philosophy that there were some significant philosophers who focused on logic rather than the senses, or at least logic with other things such as focusing on the internal/spiritual (intuition, etc.) and I'm still interested in Vedic math. Empiricist materialist scientists think experiments have more to say about reality than math/logic (which is mental, as is intuition associated with it, or spiritual) whether any of that was developed in the East or West, so such modern science is both irrational and non-spiritual. It's popular now for people to think religion should learn from science, because science produced technology, progress, etc., but people are usually focusing on the wrong type of science--materialistic, rather than classic idealist/mentalist/spiritualist. Besides that, you also have Yoga Masters saying Yoga is a science (as well as a philosophy, of course.) Similarly, and maybe not known as much, Western mysticism/esoterism/occultism (Pythagoreanism started Western esoterism, slightly more popular now) considers classic Western philosophy/science/mathematics to be a spirituality.

So, I haven't taken a position that Hinduism or science is problematic (apart from empiricist materialist science being pretty bad,) just am presenting a classic, unusual, maybe unexpected viewpoint in science to discuss anything about it here in relation to religion or Hinduism. I've described some connections, you can ignore that or anything, but this is in the proper forum for it, maybe someone is interested.